Dispatches from the 10th Crusade

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The (Muslim) Girls are All Right

A couple of items in National Review's The Week got my attention. I apologize if everyone knows about these things already; I don't keep up too well. The first concerned an actress who stars in children's movies, the Harry Potter ones to be exact:

Cute, isn't she? Her name's Afshan Azad. She's twenty-two now. The story goes that her father and brother - both British born and educated Muslims - beat her up and threatened to kill her because she refused to stop dating her Hindu boyfriend. They left her "badly bruised." The men are out on bail and awaiting trial. Afshan's taken refuge with friends in London. She has pleaded with the court to drop the charges against the two (I have no idea why), but the judge refused. There are rumors that an honor killing might have been in the offing. I don't understand why the father and brother were so upset. In this article, we find out that Hindus commit honor killings too, although the Western media tend to play those up while minimizing the Muslim variety, of which latter we also learn that Mom sometimes has her part to play.

I'm trying to imagine one of my daughters telling me that she wants to marry a Hindu, so I react by smashing her in the face and threatening to kill her. I wouldn't like it, of course. As far as I can tell, Hindus believe some odd things. But, at the very thought of hitting her, my whole being rebels, and thinking about it for too long could probably induce vomiting. The point being that in the very different regard in which women are held by Christians and Muslims, there is an abyss that cannot be bridged. My own view is that they (women) are, of the works of God's hands, the most sublimely crafted. Next to faith in God, they are what make life worth living, and no man comes into the world without first having lived in hers. I find the burka, for example, not merely a quaint cultural oddity, but a horror. It is not universal to Islamic society, but in general the Muslim woman is kept under wraps. The facets of her beauty are concealed, the delightful grace of her feminine intelligence repressed, and her will subjugated to that of the family and tribe in such degree that the power of her capacity for love may never be fully revealed. Miss Afshan was not bundled up, nor was her beauty concealed, but in the end that most awful thing of all, the denial of her freedom to love, remained intact; and if that freedom is denied her, those she was allowed have little meaning.

The other item that caught my attention concerned an Iranian woman - Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani - who was scheduled for death by stoning. She was accused of adultery and had already received 99 lashes (with what we are not told), in the wake of which she confessed but later recanted. The stoning sentence has been lifted, but she may still face death by other means, say, hanging. About the same time I also noticed that The Weekly Standard's cover story for the week was an article entitled "Should Israel Bomb Iran?" I haven't read it yet because I'm afraid of what it will say. The thing you've got to understand about the Middle East is that there are a fair number of good looking women over there. What Mother Teresa said of babies is true of beautiful women: there can never be too many. I'd hate to see any of them become statistics in a collateral damage assessment. For example, take a look at this protester:

Or this one:

Her name's Neda Agha Soltan. Unfortunately, she did become a statistic in last year's election protests. In this Youtube video, you can watch her get shot by a security forces sniper and bleed to death in a matter of seconds on the streets of Tehran.

I wish there were some way to save the women of Islam. Maybe we need a new strategy (objective, I should say, since the strategy's not completely thought out) in the War on Terror. The societies we're trying to save may not be worth saving. (This is aside from the fact that I'm not sure that should have been our purpose in the first place.) A society, or a religion, in which honor killing is known, but not the honor due to women, is worthy only of our contempt. The men of such a society don't deserve their women. So let's hit them where it hurts. I say we let the men wallow in their dungheap of tribal and misongynistic animosities, but come to the rescue of the women. They're worth saving. And to demonstrate that this offer is made in the spirit of true Christian chivalry, I'm in favor of rescuing the plain and the ugly as well as the comely. And the children too. Why the children?

Well, if the sources Kevin Jones consults are reliable, terrible things are being done to children in Afghanistan while Allied soldiers are instructed to look the other way, becoming parties to the crime. In this country - in the West in general - we gnash our teeth in rage over the crimes of Catholic priests and weep not when a Father Geoghan is murdered for it in prison. In Afghanistan, our soldiers have to treat "Man Sex Thursday" as a cultural curiosity, a mere "difference" of which they are not qualified to judge. When of course they should be putting a bullet through a rapist's head.

I'm not sure how it will work. But rather than taking the fight to them before they bring it to us, let's instead try luring them with what they claim most to despise, frivolous and decadent Western leisure activities. I saw on the news that NASA has a new function described as Outreach to Muslims, apparently an exercise in raising their self-esteem. They are to be reminded of their great accomplishments of the past, whatever those were. We are no longer the wicked Crusader or the Great Satan, but rather therapist to the Muslim masses. I don't know how that's supposed to work either, but if we're going to press an arm of the federal leviathan into service (most of them need something else to do anyway), why not merge the military objective with the social uplift? We're an open borders nation. Come to America, ye Muslims. For the women and kids, a month's worth of free tickets to Six Flags and Disney world, and for the men (following the lead of Mohammed Atta) complimentary visits to strip clubs of their choice (we have plenty here in Florida), free drinks and foot-washing basins included. To prove that we don't hold too much resentment over 9/11, we could sweeten the pot by offering to teach them how to fly the space shuttle or letting them ride within the nosecone of any missile of their choosing. Once we have the women and children apart from the men, we offer freedom if they want it. Some won't, but at least they get to choose. On the way to the strip club, the men are instead driven to a secure location and held there (in better than Gitmo conditions) until the women and kids have had their fun, then put on an airplane back to their sandbox.

Others may have a better way to go about it. Fine, let's hear it. There might also be unwanted side effects. A man without a woman - even one who thinks she belongs to a lesser species - can be a dangerous animal. He'll fight to get her back, not to defend her divinely appointed equality, but to reclaim the tyranny of his mating rights.

As for our military involvement in various Muslim snakepits, I suppose each one needs evaluating on its merits. But as to Afghanistan, the enemy of our enemy is hardly our friend. Either save the women and children or get the hell out.

Comments (33)

Divinely appointed equality?

Last I checked, America was being billed as an utterly secular nation. Meaning one hellbent on keeping religious ideals, and any God talk, out of our policies. Out of our universities too. Now and then, even out of our churches - or at least minimized and watered down. Of course, I fail to see what a bribery of Six Flags, Disney World, and strip clubs (even if that one, apparently, is a lie) has to do with seeking to further "divinely appointed equality" anyway.

Though that Strip Clubs talk is interesting. After all, we ARE talking about the "work of God's hands" as you call it. So how are we treating God's handiwork in our country? Will I see their divinely appointed equality respected on TV? In movies? Music? On the internet? How about in our culture at large? Our abortion industry? That "True Christian Chivalry" you speak of - is it the norm? The exception?

Oh, and speaking of Christian chivalry, is it really chivalrous - or Christian - to have such utter contempt for what Christians would have to consider deeply misguided men, such that we have no problem letting them "wallow in a dungheap"? Not sure where that quote comes from. Mother Teresa again, perhaps?

Look, I understand the disgust that we look upon honor killings with, or treating women as property. And I think Christians should do their damndest, particularly as Christians, to stop those killings, to stop that abysmal treatment, and to best influence the muslim world. But frankly, Christians also have to exert one hell of a lot of influence on the west as well, because the west's track record on treating "God's handiwork" is pretty despicable lately.

And I suppose that's the point, for me. Do Christians want change in Afghanistan? In other countries? Then we better decide what sort of change that's supposed to be, and whether the government - as opposed to the churches, the missionaries, the christians themselves - is who should be providing the help. Because if Kevin Jones is right, our government is there advising soldiers not to impose our moral judgments on the native culture. Maybe the next step we'll take is one where arguing that some parts of the native culture is vile enough that it requires change - say, prohibitions against abortion.

The men, incidentally, need our help too. If it helps, remember that they used to be children too.

Yeah, John H., I'm sure those southern Irish Catholics would beat the heck out of her.

These facile parallels always anger me.

Bill, welcome back. No time for more now, but for the record, I believe that there is a question about whether Ms. Azad actually begged for the charges to be dropped, on the grounds that the claims to the news that she had done so came from the lawyer for her attackers.

It's funny that you should post this now. Since yesterday when Congress was voting to continue funding the Afghan war and in light of the dramatic increase in American military loss of life this last month, I have been agonizing over this difficult war and praying that we won't allow ourselves to get bogged down as the Russians did. At first I had confidence because we had studied their failed strategy which was a conventional military strategy and we began the war by employing tactics which involved small engagements by non-uniformed soldiers. We also began to reach out to the tribal leaders.
Things have changed for the worse and it appears that even though the Taliban appeared to have stumbled it was just regrouping and of course being rearmed and funded from outside their own borders. Pakistan offers sanctuary along the border and apparently, even though I have not read the leaked papers being discussed in the news, the Afghan government officials are playing two sides from the middle. This could simply be a case of deceitful and corrupt politicians benefitting from the U.S. dollars flowing in as aid while really being sympathetic to the Taliban. Or it could be that those government officials are trying to cover their own rear ends because of the insecurity they feel with Barack Obama as president. Either way, our servicemen our dying in greater numbers. I don't care about the Afghan officals and I really don't care about the political careers of our political class.
So now we must adjust our strategy and tactics and I would continue to have confidence that the military could meet the challenge except that we have a child in the White House who is incapable of the leadership that is necessary to fight and win a war. He is committed to social change here, but has no backbone. He has no courage. He does not inspire confidence in the troops even though he is supposed to be the Commander in Chief.
Realizing that, I am starting to feel hopeless and as I meditate on the dilemma I have decided, as far as the country of Afghanistan is concerned, that I am most tormented over the plight of the women who have literally stepped out in faith, faith in the American presence, to become full citizens without fear fo reprisals. If we leave, whether quickly or more slowly, if the withdrawal is premature in any way, they will be slaughtered for desiring full humanity.
I have never really recovered from watching our helicopters lift off from the roof of the American embassy in Saigon with our Vietnamese collaborators hanging from whatever they could grasp. We abandoned them and I don't know if I can stand watching another similar situation especially knowing the retribution will be borne mostly by the women.
I don't care if we were right or wrong for invading Afghanistan (we were right), or if we have been right or wrong for increasing our presence there lately. All I know is that this is a mission of mercy to at least establish some form of santuary for the women of Afghanistan.
Men play fantasy football, I have been playing fantasy War on the Taliban. I fantasize about removing the women and all children under 12 to a safe zone. Then I fantasize that our miltary gets to go to war like real men in a real war on the field of battle. In this case maybe in the mountains and crags of Afghanistan, but able to fight without the worry of taking out civilian populations of those same women and children I worry about. Or maybe having the ability to use more powerful bombs without taking out civilian populations. I am not a military strategist, but I can dream.

"Rescue those who are being taken away to death;
hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.
If you say, 'Behold, we did not know this,' does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?
Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will he not repay man according to his work?" Prov. 24:11&12

A bit of background: IslamOnline.net was established by the well-known cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi, famous in part for his fatwas justifying Palestinian terror attacks, so the site does not represent some "moderate" Islam that is rejected by most Muslims (the fatwa linked to above also mentions the killing of apostates as one of the forms of justified killing).

Unrelated to the above, does no other regular commenter on this site, regardless of their views of the danger of the Jihad, etc., etc., etc, find this an egregiously offensive generalization: "The point being that in the very different regard in which women are held by Christians and Muslims, there is an abyss that cannot be bridged."

Instead of finding ways as Christians to bring Muslim women and children to America in order to rescue them from their native "dungheaps", how about finding moral and ethical ways as Americans to get the Muslims already here to return to their homelands?

I have to add a caveat about generalizations about women from these cultures. I can bring in links later if needed, but to keep it quicker, I'll just give the info: Unfortunately, all too many Muslim women are complicitous or even more than that when it comes to the mistreatment of their children. Where FGM is common, it is often the women who are pushing it. The women will bring in hired mutilators to "do" their little daughters secretly in Western countries. The women hold the little girls down. Plenty of the women really believe in it, sometimes even against the wishes of the father. Or take honor killings: In one honor killing case (I believe it was Aqsa Parvez, in Canada), the mother knew ahead of time that her husband and son were going to attack Aqsa. Not only did she do nothing to stop it, but she refused in so many words to condemn it after Aqsa was dead. She was rather surprised, though. She told bystanders, "I thought he was just going to break arms and legs, not kill her." She sadly blamed the daughter, whom they had tried to "talk to" about her Western ways. Then there is the recent case of spousal rape in New Jersey, in which the mother-in-law of the abused wife was fully on-board with the way the husband was treating his wife and sat about complacently in the other room while he raped his wife as she cried.

The whole culture is the problem. It's certainly true that the culture bears especially harshly on women, but too many of the women have signed on to the wicked cultural demands and practices and help to subdue the others, mutilate the little girls, and bring back into line those of their fellow women who "stray."

Here's some food for thought. Sometimes it happens in families that you find good children who have deeply flawed - even horribly flawed - parents. But I think the goodness in those children is due, at least in some small part, to some corresponding goodness in the parent.

The same goes for women. In other cultures, perhaps you find many good women, and the men you find primitive and patriarchal and misogynistic and so on. But I think that without certain characteristics of those men, you wouldn't find those women so good after all. Many of these middle-eastern females living in America escape the influence of their men, assimilate to our culture, and lose all of their virtues, ruining their lives. We can "take" their women, but in most cases we're not really going to help them.

If you want to know something about the adults in a particular family, look at the children. If you want to know something about the men of a particular country, look at the women. And give credit where credit is due.

(Mike T., I hope I was clear enough that I was being sarcastic. I think the parallel to southern Irishmen was absurd.)

You were quite clear.

Anyone who knows the South knows that while most of us may be civilized enough to let the police get the first crack at it, there are few southern juries that would ever find that the prosecution had enough evidence to convict if those who attacked her mysteriously ended up dead.

I'm afraid I can't really agree, Jeff. That seems like a weak generalization. If we have a young woman who is being continually threatened and beaten and eventually slain by her father, I see no reason whatsoever to give her father any "credit" for her good characteristics. Similarly, if parents are really, truly abusive of their children--I'm talking here about serious beatings, burning with cigarettes, sexual abuse, and the like--and the children have some good qualities, are maybe even (miraculously) wonderful kids, I'm not going to give the horribly abusive parents "credit" for this. I'm going to admit that humanly speaking, this is extremely hard to explain and give God the credit, period.

It's certainly true that young women can be harmed in important ways by being assimilated to a decadent Western culture. But it doesn't follow that we should give some sort of credit to a truly oppressive and, in its own different way, decadent Muslim culture for female goodness. As I have said many times before, Islam and decadent Western liberalism are incommensurable evils. This is true of their treatment of women; it is true of the fate of women within each of them. It would be the wrong question to ask whether some young woman is "better off" being married against her will at the age of twelve to a husband who beats and rapes her (in between episodes of raping the maid) than if she becomes an American and ends up promiscuous and libertine in thought, word, and deed. Both are horrible fates, each in its different way. The one thing that can be said in favor of the American route is that becoming a libertine is not _done to_ her (we are not determinists), so at least there she had the opportunity to choose a better way, perhaps even to become a Christian, like Rifqa Bary.

That's the thing that drives me crazy about you and various other contributors to this site. You could've said, "I think the statement is accurate if changed to 'the vast majority of Muslims' and 'the vast majority of Christians.'" Or some other variation that introduced the slightest modification. But you subscribe to it whole hog. No exceptions. I know you like to call a spade a spade, but that kind of blanket generalization is simply absurd. All it takes to disprove it is to find one bad Christian (like, say, this one: http://www.dailystaregypt.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=16923) and one good Muslim. Now I don't think the preceding link means that there's some type of equivalency between Muslims and Christians in regard to the problem of honor killing; it's overwhelmingly a Muslim one. But the kinds of ungrounded, irresponsible condemnations trafficked in at this site demonstrate a kind of Christian chauvinism and unvarnished hostility towards Muslims that's truly breathtaking.

@Lydia: I admit to a certain amount of willful tendentiousness in my interpretation of Bill Luse's claim. But c'mon: The preceding sentences describe the visceral revulsion he feels at the thought of harming one of his daughters. He then makes the blanket statement at issue. What am I supposed to draw from that? It seems pretty clear to me: Muslim men (which ones? Well, he never deigns to clarify) don't feel any aversion to physically harming their daughters.

I could choose to interpret the statement more generously. But given that the rest of the piece contains various (tongue-in-cheek? semi-serious?) proposals to rescue Muslim women from their men, given that it also indulges in various stereotypes about lascivious Muslim men (again, without qualification), and given the general hostility to Muslims expressed on this site, I don't see why I should. There's plenty to condemn about the behavior of many Muslims without resorting to the kind caricature evidenced in Luse's piece.

@c matt: I don't think it makes sense to talk about the regard in which Christianity and Islam hold women. Islam, for instance, has a number of texts relating to the status and treatment of women. Some are repellent. Some seem ok. Many are vague. Others are contradictory. Muslims interpret those texts. Some do so in a way that results in a disgusting, abhorrent view of women. The majority seem to do so in a way that I find offensive. Others seem to do an ok job of it. Christianity is similar, though I thinks it's fair to say that most Christians hold views of women that are preferable to those of most Muslims. But gulf that cannot be bridged? Implications that Muslims, without qualification, don't feel physical revulsion at inflicting physical harm on their daughters? Please.

Muslim men (which ones? Well, he never deigns to clarify) don't feel any aversion to physically harming their daughters.

If you just keep up with events in the world, you'll find out that a whole heck of a lot of such men manage overcome any such revulsion that they might feel. So do their sons vis a vis their sisters. And they justify this in terms of dishonor to the family. The brother (named Islam, coincidentally) of Amina and Sarah Said _expressly_ justified his sisters' murder, saying that his father, the alleged murderer (who has disappeared) was the "real victim," that his sisters "knew the rules." We could go on with honor victim after honor victim. One father said that his daughter was "making him naked" by her Western ways. There is nothing remotely like the proportion of such vile crimes on such grounds against daughters and sisters among those identified as Christians.

The facts are what they are. They justify a non-negligible amount of generalization. Liberals just don't like them and want to try to imply that this sort of thing is somehow so atypical that generalizations are bad and unfair. Too bad. Evidence does not support the liberal point of view.

I acknowledge the role of women in some of these atrocities. I recommend the foxnews link (it's an actual essay, not a drive-by summary) which I think you'll appreciate. Re Afshan, one report claims she pleaded for the charges to be dropped from a room adjacent to the courtroom in which her father and brother were being arraigned. I can't be sure of its accuracy, as the details of this case seem scant at the moment.

I like very much Gina Danaher's fantasy life.

J.C. - I mean Jeff Culbreath - thanks for your appreciation, but no quarter, nor credit, can be given until the wholesale subjugation of women (backed by force of custom and law) has been renounced, or unless the end justify the means.

Some of the other commenters seem unaffected by the barbarities referred to, nor to have read Kevin Jones' post and the supplied links. One, regarding the rape of a boy in Afghanistan, is too graphic to reproduce here.

Btw, Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani's lawyer has gone missing after being interrogated for four hours in an Iranian prison, and his wife and her brother detained. Sakineh is still in prison (for adultery) and still faces either hanging or stoning. There are currently about 12 women on death row in Iran awaiting this fate.

that link doesn't list the war on poverty, war on crime, war on drugs, and whosoever the golub corp were at war with when they declared themselves to be "looking for soldiers." There are also the drug wars taking place in American cities and neighborhoods. Also, when the po-po come out in riot gear to handle peaceful demonstrators, I don't know what war that is for. Then there is the concerted effort by Switzerland, France, and Poland to drug and sodomize American girls. So hardly a complete list.

Nike, I have a friend who is a Ghanian priest of a parish in Ghana, who says that the view on the ground in his part of Africa is the same: Of the trouble places in Africa, generally the Muslims are involved. Yes, there are a few exceptions, but a small minority. Where Christianity is in the ascendant, peace or at least civil rest is common. Where Muslims are coming to be in the ascendant, it is not.

If you read the works of Phyllis Chesler, she reported a few weeks ago that the reports of Azad supposedly wanting charges against her father and brother dropped were actually false claims circulated by the lawyer working for father and brother. I hope that's the case, because their actions CANNOT be excused or go unpunished.

that link doesn't list the war on poverty, war on crime, war on drugs, and whosoever the golub corp were at war with when they declared themselves to be "looking for soldiers." There are also the drug wars taking place in American cities and neighborhoods. Also, when the po-po come out in riot gear to handle peaceful demonstrators, I don't know what war that is for. Then there is the concerted effort by Switzerland, France, and Poland to drug and sodomize American girls. So hardly a complete list.

Yeah, John H., I'm sure those southern Irish Catholics would beat the heck out of her.

Surely you can distinguish a cause that is sufficient to produce an effect on its own from a cause which is only sufficient to produce an effect in conjunction with other causes? Context here is crucial.

My point is only this: that Muslims have a distaste for Hindus which extends beyond a difference of belief. It also has to due with the long-standing violence between the communities. No doubt the lower regard for women in Islam contributes to the extremity of the reaction, but some kind of outrage is to be expected.

Also, to be honest I am not confident at all that a father from the IRA wouldn't kill his daughter if she married someone from the Ulster Defense Association. I would need more evidence to form an opinion either way.

From your link:
"The United Nations defines "major wars" as military conflicts inflicting 1,000 battlefield deaths per year." I remember when NYC alone was suffering double that. Several of those listed wars are directly and indirectly related to Marxism and the drug trade, so its perfectly fit to compare them to the situation in American cities. But perhaps that since the worst of it took place in the seventies and eighties, not counting the Mexican border states, we can discount that as evidence of why people fight, and who inclines toward violence.

Certainly, Europe has been a force for world peace throughout the last 500 years. And it has not even had a concerted genocide, excluding abortion and contraception, since the nineties- except for Chechnya maybe, but really, only muslims would refuse Russian rule. Who but they?

If we bring a load of Muslim women and children over here, meanwhile eradicating or quarantining all the men back in whateveristan, why wouldn't the Muslim women then living in America proceed to raise a bunch of Muslim boys into Muslim men, thus reproducing the problem here, and in fact worsening it at a far greater rate here than is already the case?

I.e., if the problem of Muslim mistreatment of women stems from Muslim culture, it would seem that the only way of protecting those women is to increase the rate of apostasy from Islam to Christianity.

Woah your a bigoted idiot, the hijab is only to hide the beauty so that men see women for their intelligence and wit and personality qualities rather than beauty (because some men like in all societies are perverts), which would objectify a women as a mere sexual object without a voice, like western media does, and not give them a voice. don't forget muslims women were philosophers and respected scholars, even went to war, were trained as doctors, had and still according to islam have the right to divorce without permission of husband, have still the right of inheritance while until the last century the fortune would go to male heir, while christians at the same time were burning christian women at stake, killing them, not giving them right to divorce, inheritance even get educated let alone be doctors, (only now, thanks to SECULARISM, christian women have rights, while islam had already given these rights to the women in practise and theory in the 6th century, though isomer muslims and middle easterners seem to have forgotten them today) etc - just cause some muslims here and have committed such acts, its nothing to do with islam, its not all or most muslims, and your argument is thus highly lacking in logic and only proves your fanaticism and hate.
west is such a child, worse than the 'islamic ' terrorist, cannot accept anything different from it, while normal muslims who follow our true peaceful teachings just sit quietly and peacefully and laugh at you guys. thats why u don't see us in the news.
yeah, you know nothing about true peaceful islam, you just let your ears fill up of hate and use a few incidents as racial/religious profiling to label a whole group. we don't need you to spread more hate in our world. just cause a couple of crazies pop up, doesn't mean the religion has anything to do with it. muslim women are more educated and intelligent than you morons.

OH AND , THERES NO PUNISHMENT OF APOSTACY IN ISLAM- THATS JUST SOMETHING THE EXTREMISTS HAVE CREATED OUT OF THEIR OWN IMAGINATION. YOUR ONLY ALLOWED TO DEFEND YOURSELF AFTER SOMEONE ELSE TOOK UP ARMS AGAINST YOU, AND 'THERE IS NO COMPULSION IN RELIGION,' -QURAN.

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